Thursday, November 03, 2011

PARTY by TOM LEVEEN

Congratulations!
Shannyn (Toni)
Please email me at stephanieelliot@gmail.com with your full name and mailing address so I can get your book to you!





When I first heard about this author and his YA book called PARTY, well, what do you think? I had to get my hands on it. I haven’t had time to finish it yet, but I'm almost done and the chapters that I have read are amazing. There is an end-of-the-year party junior year in Santa Barbara and each chapter is told from the perspective of one of eleven people. 

How each of the 11 kids’ lives intersect during that one night and how their lives forever change because of how the night goes is detailed dramatically and realistically in Tom Leveen’s debut novel. 

It’s very Breakfast Clubby/Sixteen Candle-ish so if you’re from that era, this book will be right up your alley!

PARTY is geared toward the 9-12 grade set but I’m a big fan of young adult books so I always like to pick up a few. Of course now that I have teens of my own, I like to know what I’ll be dealing with when they get into high school. Oh boy, please help me!

Check out the very cool book trailer below. Can you just totally see it as a movie? I can!




If you’d like to enter to win a copy of PARTY, tell me something you did that was kind of crazy at a high school party. I didn’t do this but I did freak out when we had just moved to Illinois and I was at my new friends’ home and the girls and the guys got in the parent’s hot tub ... NEKKID!!!! 

I was like, “NO WAY AM I GONNA DO THAT!” I was obviously hanging around a very ‘skilled’ crowd at the time. I was only 16! OMG! However, I did sneak in and take a photo with a Polaroid camera and kept it in order to blackmail the girls later on that year when we were no longer friends! Hahahah!

Share a high school party memory (doesn’t have to be a crazy one!) to enter to win PARTY!

74 comments:

Unknown said...

Good Lord. When I was a senior, I was drinking "punch" because I didn't drink alcohol. Um, no one bothered to tell me it was spiked! Apparantly I found it necessary to open the bathroom door anytime some one was in there (the house we were at didn't have a lock on the door) and I would fall in to the tub. I kissed many boys. I threw up, a LOT. I passed out and hit my head on the corner of a table which resulted in a black eye. They drug me through the snow trying to sober me up.

I just thank God to this day I remember almost none of it!

Katie said...

I once went to a sleepover where the parents were out all night. I was only in 6th grade. Needless to say my mom would not let me go ove there again!

Amy R. said...

I honestly have way too many stories about high school parties. Most of them ended up getting busted by the cops, something huge broke, people peed on things, and someone ended up crying. Good memories.

Kristi said...

I can't remember anything that would be good enough or interesting enough for here. My house was always a good place for my friends and I to hang out. We had a trampoline and of course we would always have to go out and jump. Afterwards, everyone would sit on the trampoline and talk. We called those our "trampoline talks" and let me tell you, many relationships began and ended on that trampoline!

Kristi Hooke

Bev V said...

A sledding party, involving Southern Comfort, very cold weather, and broken glasses. I'm glad I had a good friend to get me home!

Melissa said...

I was pretty boring. Melissa Rem

TaraUB said...

Probably the party the night before prom at St. Henry. I fell off the roof 3 times ( it was built into the hill so it wasn't that high, and why did people keep putting me back up there?). I also had into the horseshoe pit and had a bruise the whole length of my shin that looked great with my prom dress. And, yes, alcohol was involved.

Unknown said...

The night before I was to register for my senior year, my friend's parents were out of town & she decided to host a party for a small group of friends (only about 12 people total). When I got picked up from work to go, the hostess was already passed out & in no shape to continue partying. It was the first time I decided to drink & I got completely sloshed. Of course I ended up sick. :( I spent the majority of my night half passed out, but half running to the bathroom. In 1 of my many trips to the bathroom that night I saw my best friend & her boyfriend doing the nasty. Though to this day I don't know if she was even aware of what was going on, I was too wasted to intervene at all, but she didn't seem alert. Another trip to pray to the porcelain gods I passed a friend of the dude doing the nasty going through drawers with a sock on his hand. The consequences of this party were HORRENDOUS!! I had cops come to my high school to interview me because I was always conveniently NOT HOME when they stopped by there! OMG I was scared straight of drinking after that...didn't drink again until I was 21. LOL So my senior year id photo is the first picture ever of me hungover. :)

ludy2288 said...

there was always lots of shenanigans at our high school parties, but one time my friend wanted me to do a fake 'cop scare' so all of the people we didnt know would leave cause it was getting a little out of control. someone chopped down a big tree in her parents front yard & people were everywhere. i forgot to tell a few of our close friends that it was just fake & one still has scars from the fence he got caught in running away.

Ncsuloges said...

I love young adult, stop laughing at me! I really never did anything crazy I was too much ofa nerd and scared to get in trouble

EBrowning said...

I never did anything too wild but I do remember going to a party or having a party pretty much every weekend. I really miss those carefree days and the fun times I had. Sometimes I think I'd like to do it all over again...but then I remember all of the drama that went along with being in high school and I think again! :)

Literary Chanteuse said...

Well I used to be a band in high school so for a party the boys brought instruments and we rocked the house. It was a blast! Good times!

Margaret(singitm)

Jessica said...

I didn't really go to high school parties. I know, pretty lame. My friends and I usually just went to the movies or went bowling.

Thanks!
-Jessica M
walkingcorpse11@hotmail.com

Kristi said...

I was an extremely wild teenager. Something happened any time there was a party, whether it was the cops raiding it, fights, people throwing up. I think the worst thing my best friend and I ever did was sneak out of the house, steal her fathers bronco to go to a party. When we got home and crawled in the window he was waiting for us.

LizzybethDJ said...

Although I was a bit of a "partier" in high school, nothing really wild ever happened. My brother was the one who always found himself at the party where something exciting happened - cops, strippers, hot tubs...

Philadelphia said...

I was a super innocent good girl in high school. The worst thing I did was sneak out of the house to walk around my neighborhood (and my parents knew I was doing it). College on the other-hand.... Well I made up for my good ways in high school.

-Philly5

MonaLisa said...

I didn't do much crazy stuff during high school. My sister and I are close in age and had the same group of friends one year. We went to a party where she got plastered and I had my first alcoholic drink...one sip of this mixture of different wines. By the end of the night she really couldn't drive so I had to try. It was a year before I got my learners so I was really bad at it and ended up sitting for a while and then chancing it with her driving. Being late for curfew luckily was the only bad thing that happened.

Crystal said...

I was so not that exciting. LOL!! the only "rebellious" thing i remember was when I would tell my mom I was going to the movies with a bunch of my girl friends and then our boyfriends would end up meeting us there.

and we wouldn't even watch the movie.

;)

Even then that happened like two or three times. LOL!!

crystal717

krstrpp said...

I was pretty much a nerd in high school and always left the parties before the cops were called. Thanks for the chance to win the book!

Emma S. said...

Probably the worst thing I did in high school was when my friends and I broke into one of our mom's liquor cabinets (which was locked) and drank all her vodka. We then refilled all the bottles up with water. Needless to say, she caught on very quickly.

jdstec said...

young enough to be taken and picked up by my parents. Left the party with a guy (who could drive) and was not back by the time my parents came to get me.

BrendaL71 said...

I have to say that actually my high school years were very tame. Parents were pretty strict. I was much more rebellious when I was 18 and in college. Who wasn't, right?

Juliet Farmer said...

i went to a party, which was crazy enough for me!

Julia Maranan said...

I'm not a very rebellious person by nature, so I don't have many party stories. But my high school church youth group was very into TP-ing the houses of people who hadn't been to group recently. It was extremely good-natured, and our parents knew we were doing it, but we had an awful lot of fun sneaking around in the dark trying not to wake the neighbors!

Julia
julia_maranan at hotmail dot com

Ready To Be A Momma said...

I did a lot of crazy things in high school. The one I remember the most is the first time I drank alcohol, I ended up nreaking a pool stick, screaming at my friends older brother, and drunk dialing my best friends boyfriend about a million times around 3am.
qweska8402

LynnBelo said...

I was a good kid and total nerd in high school. I never went to a party. I definitely shrugged that image and had a ton of fun in college though! :)

Margie said...

I don't have any interesting stories to tell. I wasn't a party person.

Liz said...

Used a clean pair of thong underwear as a slingshot. Nuff said.
Liz from Betty Tuesdays

Megan said...

I went to three high school parties and the one that sticks out memory that sticks out the most is that I wore a halter top dress (super rebellious) and we played charades!
ID eloisepeaches

J-15 said...

Was in high school in the late 60's early 70's. Most were in basements or in really big houses. Don't remember specifics, just a lot of good music, black lites, strawberry wine, etc. Ah, the good ol days lol

Denise said...

I did a lot of stupid things in high school. For instance, I had some friends over once when my parents were away, nothing crazy, but we were stupid enough to take pictures. Which my father found the day of the big black out in NYC, when he borrowed my car and was looking in the glove box for a map because he was lost in Brooklyn. He didn't tell me, just put them back in the glove box and waited until we were on vacation with my best friend's family. One night he went out to my car, got the pictures that were still there, came back inside, and just tossed them on the dinner table for everyone to see. That was a super pleasant moment!

Jenn3128 said...

I am the oldest of 6 children, I never went to a party, I was always watching the younger siblings. Made up for it in my 20's, and I'm not sharing those stories here!

Dani In Chicago said...

I guess the only crazy thing I did at a party was get really drunk. Pretty boring I know. I had a big party at my house once when my parents were away about 200 people showed up from both high schools in my area. The party lasted 45 minutes until the cops broke it up. But the following monday everyone still said it was the best party they'd been to!

Melissa said...

Oh man, I didn't really do anything crazy in high school. I was a bit of a nerd! I guess having a sleepover and TPing ppl. I'm so boring.
-tmd636

Bernadette7 said...

ahh I distinctly remembering hoping a fence out of my friends backyard when his dad came home...abandoning my best friend and boyfriend...every man for himself!

Krystal said...

When we were sophomores, we had a party in my girlfriend's pole barn. We thought we were so cool bc we were drinking watermelon pucker and snuck into her dad's OLD stash of Old Milwaukee's Best-yuck!
kndyer

Ally said...

11th grade, my parents went away for a weekend and I had 3 girlfriends over. We got a bottle of bicardi and I have never been that sick in my life.

Shannyn (Toni) said...

Haha! This got me to thinking... so many crazy times back in the days. :)

One of the first ones that come to my mind:

Summer between 9th and 10th grade. Our High School was 10th to 12th. I stayed with my best friends, and we were all going to get our schedules and our IDs together the next day. We were excited! We went to a party the night before, at an 11th grade boy's house. We thought we were IT. Well, of course there was beer (yeah, I know.. bad), and there was a swimming pool with a slide. We were having a blast and decided to have a bon fire. Of course, the grassy field behind the house caught on fire. And, in all of our QUICK THINKING, we worked as a TEAM. Made a line from the pool to the edge of the field and passed 2 small buckets back and forth, to dump water from the pool trying to put the fire out. We weren't making much progress, the kid's older brother came home, and after laughing at us for awhile, dragged the garden hose over and had the fire out in a matter of minutes. Hey, there were about 10 of us in that line passing buckets, we thought we were smart!

Ahhhh, good times!
Shannyn (shestillsmiles @ gmail)

Anonymous said...

When I was in 11th grade, I was stupid enough to host a drunken party while my parents were away and clean the house TOO well afterwards! My mom said she knew I had a party the moment she got home as the house had never been that clean. They also found all of the beer bottle caps in one large potted plant the next day...obviously, I didn't think check the plants;) LeslieGC

Jeryl M. said...

I wasn't really much of a party person when I was in high school. My sister once had this open house party when our parents were away though. Luckily, no damage or anything was done though.

Emily said...

I went to a few small high school parties...I wasn't cool enough to be invited to the big ones. A good friend of mine would always be the one to have the party, and his dad was a town cop - he would take all our keys when we arrived and we would all sleep over. At least we were safe!

Emily116

Anonymous said...

I think back on some of the things I did as a teen, and I'm just so grateful I survived. We were so foolish at times, but thought we were so smart. Hopefully, we're a bit wiser now ... maybe?! Thanks MaNiC MoMMy
cindyinmiami
writeoncindy

Susan @ The Book Bag said...

I remember having beer parties at our house when the parents were out of town. And thinking they would never know. Small town = they knew. And we had 'beer can hill' where all the teens dropped off their beer cans. Ahhhh, fun times?

Coleen said...

I would love to say that I have a crazy high school party memory but I don't. I was the lamo that would leave a party if there was alcohol there. Anyway, I do remember going to a party where there was parents handing out condoms at the door. . .and of course I turned right around and went out to dinner with some friends. I wasn't going to get caught there. My parents would have killed me. Plus the police scared me.

Carie Casey said...

I don't think I went to high school parties. I waited till after high school and went to Navy parties with my now husband. Lots of puking and keg stands.

Carie

Books & Reviews said...

Being drunk and going to the cemetery to stand on the witches grave. Local legend said if younstood on it at midnight the grave would shake!

A.C. said...

I was a total good girl in high school and only went to one party ever, and even then it was kind of by accident. I was so afraid that I'd get in trouble that I just sat on the couch the whole time staying as far away from the alcohol as I could! I was a nerd, I know! :)

Carly said...

One of the highlights of my high school years was ditching for the first time on senior ditch day. My friend picked me up and we hung out at a piercing/tattoo place. It wasn't super exciting but I'll always remember it. :)

Carly H

Kelley said...

Too many too recount! But I do remember one night at an outside party, running from the cops and being so proud of myself that I didn't spill my beer or drop my cigarette!! Lol

Anonymous said...

Tripping on chicken wire - twice - warning peopole about it and watching them trip as well - waking up with scraped shin and knees and a big hangover - JillFay

Kim W. said...

Lots of memories...can't believe I survived my teen years (or my mother for that matter!). There was usually cops involved, breaking up the party; got a couple of "drinking under age" tickets; there was always lots of fighting, crying, laughing, hooking up, breaking up. My most memorable, though, was sneaking into someone's backyard and skinny dipping in their pool with my huge crush at the time. Until we got caught by the owners when they came home late from their own party and we didn't even hear them coming!

faithspage said...

My girlfriend and I tried to push her car down a my gravel driveway, while the car was in PARK. We wanted to cruise town, we didn't get very far.

kyfaithw at aol dot com

Tiffany Drew said...

I didn't party very much. But I can tell you that I only drank one time in my life and that was when I was 16 and drank so much that I tried taking off all my clothes to run down the street naked lol.

Christina said...

Oh my gosh, I could come up with so many things for this one! The dumbest thing I can think of is that we used to go terrace jumping. We were of course drinking, which makes it even more stupid, and we would ride in someone's truck and go driving off the terraces in the fields. I can't believe no one ever got seriously hurt!

ChristinaL

Terri said...

During our senior year, my friend and I threw a party at her Grandma's old house. Her Grandma had moved to a nursing home, but the family still had the house and were in the process of cleaning it out. The cops showed up and we all pretended like they weren't there, but I remember them shining a flashlight through the window at me and yelling "Hey you! Open up!" Man, I've never sat so still in my life and somehow, they ended up leaving. Ha! Good times!

Terri M.

Anonymous said...

Hmmm. Nothing too crazy stands out, however the last semester of my Senior year, my girlfriends and I used to get together every weekend at each other's houses and sit outside on the patios and pass around a bottle of Dark Eyes Vodka and/or Southern Comfort Whiskey with a 2L bottle of Mountain Dew chaser. Ugh! 20 years later, my stomach still turns at smell of any of those three beverages!

Colbey J

Kristen said...

We had a prank war one night that ended with lots of toilet paper, cars egged, and bricks laying all over my parents' driveway. Sounds ridiculous, but if you were there, it was awesome!

Kristen27

Melissa said...

i didn't go to parties all that much except for cast parties after plays. i wasn't involved in the crazy stuff but i think there was a water fight one time. my favorite memory is of the cast parties where the host's mom made these scones that were out of this world!

melissa a from clc

Anonymous said...

I was such a loser in high school that the few friends that I had threw a "we weren't invited to prom" party and we watched movies the entire night. I remember it as lame.

-Donna W.

buttah said...

We had a party and bon fire in the middle of some friends cow pasture, and I got drunk. So when I went to drive me and my friend home I turned on my headlights, and a huge black and white cow was standing in front of my truck, just staring at me! All I could do was "MOOOOOOO" at him and blow my horn...and laugh!!

CAnative said...

Not really a party. But co-workers and I went to a public beach after work to make a bonfire and have a couple beers after work. We were caught by beach police and one of them also happened to be the VP of my high school! This happened my senior year in HS. He recognized me and not sure if its b/c we hadn't even opened the beer or what he just made us pour it all out and let us be on our way.
Nicole

DaphneSFL said...

My senior year, my clique drove to Detroit and back in one day/night, to see a guy one of my friends was in love with. Best roadtip ever!

Kimberly Russell said...

I dont really have any! Just hanging out with my best friends

Sherry said...

My friends through me a surprise 16th Birthday party--it was our annual Halloween party but that year they made it about me. So yes I knew I was going to a party but no idea it was for me--oh and my parents delivered the cake I wanted:)

Sherry V

your invisible pixie said...

I never really went to any high school parties...I had a party at my parent's house for prom which was kind of eh. I invited a bunch of people, but most of the "cool" kids went to a hotel so they could drink. My party was the "safe house" so nothing bad happened - no drugs, no alcohol.

Erin G said...

My friends and I were pretty mild in high school... we wanted to get into trouble but never really did :)

Valerie G. said...

Most parties were actually at my house. I was left unsupervised a lot from about 13 on. I remember one where we'd send people out for street signs or letters to spell certain words (taken off store signs) when I was about 16 right before I moved. There was a whole lot of truth or dare and stuff like that.

kathygold9778 said...

My friend, who had drank too much, threw up on me in the back of her mom's station wagon....while her mom was driving. Needless to say, she was not at all happy with us!

kathygold9778

StereoQueenBee said...

High school was hell ish. I don't really have great memories.

queenofcrunk at gmail dot com

Dolly said...

I wasn't much of a party person in high school, but I do remember a slumber party in jr. high when we took the underclothes of the first girl that fell asleep, wet them, and put them in the freezer. Mom wasn't amused...

Lindsay Elizabeth said...

how about the time I had a party while my parents were away, was the drunkest one there, and flooded the bathroom? Yup. Left the sink running until water came through the light fixture over the kitchen table, through the smoke detectors, and molding. I've still never lived that one down.

Leah B said...

There are too many crazy high school stories for me to pick just one. It was probably one of the wildest times in my life.

Read Baby Read said...

All I remember clearly is red dixie cups, boys paying to get in (not girls), and a couple getting into a fight every time. So funny!

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